Silver Bells and Cockle Shells
by Madam'zelleG
Summary: A collection of responses for the 2014 December Calendar Challenge of Awesomeness challenge put on by Hades Lord of the Dead. Humor, angst, friendship, and many more genres. I make no apologies, only excuses.
1. sumatra

**Hello, all! Here's my humble offering for the 2014 December Calendar Challenge of Awesomeness! (Yep, I'm determined to make that name stick, Hades!) **

**We will be given a prompt assigned by one of the other authors participating in the challenge every day in December and it will be our task to write something based on it. With some luck, this will (hopefully) be updated daily for your reading pleasure!**

**The December 1****st**** prompt, as assigned by Ennui Enigma: **

**Sumatra**

* * *

The mind of our man Holmes, the mind of a genius. Case after case after case, so rarely thwarted in this his vocational profession. A man whose great adventures brought to our attention by one man, one blessed and dear man.

We sing our praises to the great biographer, the one who draws forth his net to trap the swimming yarns. The honored practitioner of pen to page, setting our minds alight with mystery and intrigue.

Yet the void is the subject of my story.

The disregarded tales of the giant rat of Sumatra, the aluminium crutch, the tales that bring forth wonder and a desire to read still more. We see our tales of hounds and poisons and knives, and yet we must cry out to the good doctor, _more_!


	2. snow globe

**The December 2****nd****prompt, as assigned by mrspencil:**

**Snow globe**

* * *

A tiny sphere of flowing glass

Stars of snow tracing down, down, down

A hand that brings it all to pass

Shaking the globe with pain to drown

* * *

Stars of snow tracing down, down, down

Memories from close days perished

Shaking the globe with pain to drown

A hiatus gone, the past to cherish

* * *

Memories from close days perished

Months alone, months dark, months waiting

A hiatus gone, the past to cherish

A souvenir oft left grating

* * *

Months alone, months dark, months waiting

To recall the time one came home

A souvenir oft left grating

Future promising, _not alone_

* * *

**Whyyy is it so hard to freaking format stanzas, FFN...**


	3. Sussex Downs

**The December 3****rd**** prompt, as assigned by Domina Temporis:**

**Holmes has just moved to Sussex Downs and all his new neighbors insist on welcoming him to town (bothering him).**

* * *

Alas, brother mine, I fear that my decision to move from London to Sussex Downs was one of the gravest mistakes I have ever made.

Gone are promises of peaceful nights spent absorbed in the mysteries of insectaria. Tis a joke to think one will be able to muse a newspaper over a pipe and the crackling of fire. And the idea of a passive midafternoon siesta? Lord.

What we fail to appreciate is that the country, in opposition to the city, is not a realm of quiet.

It is a place full of busybody women, prattling children, and men who have a need to support their wives' desire in everything from carpentry to near-constant chatter. A begging remark from a woman determined to feed me black pudding is not welcomed in my moments of quiet retirement.

I fail to understand, Mycroft, how you've managed to last as long as you have in the country. For I find myself unable to go much further with this business. Perhaps Watson would have been able to fend for himself, but I am not he.


	4. Drum Major

**The December 4****th**** prompt, as assigned by mrspencil:**

**Holmes puts aside his violin, and attempts to learn to play a new Instrument**

* * *

And there I lay propped up in my bed, nose a-dripping, handkerchief in hand, and empty bowl formerly containing soup to the side. The long night at Baker Street had finally come to an end, and the sun was beginning to rise; I hoped that such light would ease the discomfort of a sleep (or lack thereof) spent with an inability to breathe. So congested was my entire head that it felt rather like a solid block of wood, rather than a piece of my anatomy.

Rest was difficult to come by, but just at that time, I was beginning to feel relaxed enough that I might catch an hour or two of sleep before my illness took hold once more. I closed my eyes in the gentle light that crept into my room, taking what deep breath I could manage before trying to settle in.

And a clash of what appeared to be thunder jolted me out of my respite.

"What the devil," was all I managed to croak out before the sound happened again and again, sounding lighter but no less excitable. The door to my room opened and Holmes appeared, drum strapped to his chest and a look of intense concentration on his face.

"I must ask you, Watson," said he, staring into space, drumsticks in hand, "the correct physical proportions a man would have to be in order to be able to effectively play an instrument such as this in a crowded situation. A man's life may very well depend on your answer, so do think carefully before you say anything."

"Holmes," I said through a coughing fit that ensued as I attempted to sigh in despair. "What are you doing?"

"You're quite aware of the case of the Disemboweled Drum Major." He looked indignant. "I, for one, am not certain he would have been able to comfortably play said drum without a great deal of physical discomfort, judging by his height and the length of his arms. Wouldn't you agree? Well, I'm certain that he wasn't a drum major at all, that the real drum major is-"

"Holmes," I said, more forcefully this time, though the coughing still prevailed. "Would you kindly take that instrument downstairs and think to yourself rather than asking me?"

His face offended, he turned and made to leave the room, though he paused in the doorway before he left. "The art of drumming can be a noble one, Watson. And I'm certain that the mother of our missing drum major never discouraged him in his playing when he was a boy."

And with that, he was off out through the door and down the stairs towards his favorite chair and (hopefully) relative silence.

Falling back against the bedclothes once more, I put my head in my hands as the drums continued all the way.


	5. save haven

**The December 5****th**** prompt, as assigned by Garonne:**

**Safe haven**

* * *

We finished the pot of soup that night, something that we never did, for I normally cannot eat that much and Holmes usually chooses not to partake very much of it, that is, if he chooses to partake at all.

No sooner had Mrs. Hudson disappeared with the dishes, but then she ran up again, telling us that there was a frantic knocking at the front door. The nature of the knocking was such that Mrs. Hudson did not want to be the one to open the doors, for fear of what she would find, so Holmes and I moved to quickly, him leaping up and bounding down the stairs, I following as quickly as my cane would allow me to follow.

Holmes had flung the door open and stepped into the night before I got onto the first landing, and it was his shout that made me continue faster, and I am honestly not certain how my body was able to react to the situation that quickly. When I made if far enough in order to see who our visitor was, I could understand his shock, and it spurred me on to reach their side as quickly as I could.

Holmes was kneeling over a body, the man with his hands over his face, rocking back and forth, and he called for me to hurry. I saw blood from between the fingertips, and shouted for Mrs. Hudson, to grab my bag from my bedside. With some difficulty, I managed to get into a kneeling position next to the man, and gently speak to him, putting one of my hands on top of his. "Let me see your face."

With some reluctance, the man took his hand away, and I was astonished to see that it was Lestrade, his right eye covered in blood dripping into his silvering hair. He seemed conscious and at least somewhat lucid as Holmes attempted to speak with him.

Holmes looked at me before I nodded. "We need to get him upstairs."

My friend simply took a deep breath and picked the detective inspector up with such tenderness as I have never seen, and made his way slowly up the stairs. His movements may have been slow, but they were also deliberate and gentle so as not to cause the man any unnecessary pain. When he made it to the top of the stairs, he gently set the man down on the sofa, not even caring that his shirt was now soaked in blood.

The look on Holmes's face was one that I had never quite seen before. But there was no time to delay, and I stripped my jacket off as I made to kneel before the sofa, groaning involuntarily as my leg cried out in protest. I nearly lost my balance and would have if Holmes had not reached out and grabbed me under the arms to help steady me. I reached for the inspector again and was forced to peel his hands back again, so that I could look at his face.

"Lestrade, what happened?" Holmes had taken it upon himself to make sure that he remained conscious. "Are you all right?"

Lestrade was nodding softly, faintly, murmuring under his breath as though he had no idea what was going on. He wasn't nearly as lucid as we had previously thought. Holmes and I exchanged a look as I cleaned the blood away. There was little to be done. But I nodded for Holmes to continue speaking so that he would be able to at least keep Lestrade conscious throughout the dressing of whatever wound he had managed to incur.

Once I had cleaned the worst of the blood away, I was able to see a long gash in his face that traveled from his forehead through his left eye and down his cheek. A closer examination of the wound revealed that it must have been a knife that caused this, and that it had just barely scratched the surface of the eyeball. It was horrific to observe, since the entire eye had now gone red. But in many ways, Lestrade was very fortunate. It could have been a lot worse.

After my stitches were done, Holmes helped Lestrade to drink a bit of brandy. He had been lucid enough to insist that no, he had no desire for us to get him to a hospital; he would much prefer remaining here with us in Baker Street. We knew that we would be remaining with him for the rest of the night to make sure that there was no change for the worse.

After he'd choked down some brandy, he looked so exhausted that it made my heart wrench. He had a piece of cotton secured over his injured eye, and as of now, the bleeding seemed minimal. As we were all very aware, the night ahead of us was going to be very long, and if he was not able to regain his mental faculties at all by the morning…

It had taken us much longer than I'd realized to bandage the wounds and get him cleaned up. By the time we sat back, almost equally as exhausted, it was very late, the clock was nearly about to strike midnight. I coughed slightly, now that I'd had a moment to regain my breath.

"If you'd like, Holmes, why don't you go and get some rest. I'll stay with him."

Holmes shook his head vehemently. "No, Watson. I'll remain here with him. You go and rest."

We did not want to disturb him, now we'd finally gotten him to sleep. In the end, we both decided to let him lie, both of us sitting in our favorite chairs and stealing glances over at his body every now and again to convince ourselves that he was still breathing.

The night was very long, even though Lestrade appeared to be sleeping peacefully. By this time, he was a single man once again, for his wife had died a few years previous. His two children were grown and moved away so he had very little to go on. No family for us to contact and tell that he was narrowly escaping death at this very moment.

The next morning, we had both fallen asleep in our chairs, though Holmes was far more awake than I was, his supple form eternally ready for action. And once he realized that Lestrade had awoken, he was on his feet in an instant, at his side and speaking quietly with a glass of water in his hand.

I could hear Lestrade talking softly in response to whatever Holmes was asking. He kept his voice low to avoid causing the detective inspector any unnecessary discomfort. I reached around for my cane for a moment before I made it to their side.

The blood from his face had soaked through the bandage during the night and I took his bandage off and drew from the hot water that Mrs. Hudson had left shortly before any of us had awoken. Lestrade was quiet while I cleaned the new blood of his face, until I drew closer to his eye.

I paused before I reached his eye, suddenly aware of the fact that only his uninjured eye appeared to be moving. "Lestrade, can you see my cloth?" I asked, gently waving my cloth in front of the injured eye.

He squinted, unsure of what to say. His hesitation made me draw in my breath, though not in a manner that would be distracting to the injured detective inspector; I had been able to tell even before I asked him that his eye simply wasn't seeing anything.

"Never mind that," I said briskly, trying to make him feel at ease again. "How are you feeling?"

"Got quite the headache," he mumbled, trying to put a hand to where I was now bandaging the wound. "You can imagine."

I chuckled, tying off the bandage so that his face now appeared clean and protected. "I certainly can."

He shrugged, eyes closed. "You know me. I'm never bored."

"What happened last night, Lestrade?" Holmes asked, his tone gentle while still being coaxing. "You certainly did cause us a lot of concern."

Lestrade shook his head, still keeping his good eye closed. "No, no, nothing like that," he insisted. "It wasn't like that."

"Then what was it like?" asked Holmes.

Lestrade took a breath. "We'd been chasing a man down the lane and he suddenly stopped and hid around a corner. I was running after him with a constable because he'd been getting away with some stolen jewels. And he was hidden around that corner, and then just jumped out of nowhere when I rounded the corner. Knifed me in the face. Managed to fight him off, constable arrested him, and we got him shipped back to the Yard. I needed to go home because my head was aching. I thought it was just a surface wound."

He trailed off, grimacing again. After a moment, I said to him, "I'm so sorry, Lestrade, would you like something stronger than brandy for the pain?"

He shrugged, and opened his good eye. "Do you really think you have anything that could help?"

I smiled, and reached into my bag to find a vial of morphine. Holmes pretended not to see it, getting up and moving over to the window, but I sensed that it wasn't just to give Lestrade a sense of privacy.

I injected the morphine into Lestrade's system, and his eyes closed again. "If you two don't mind," he said, taking another deep breath, "I think that I'm going to take a bit of a rest. I need some sleep, try to recover my strength."

I nodded, struggling to my feet and allowing him a moment as Holmes looked pensively out the window at the relative safety of Baker Street.

* * *

**Well, that was a lot darker than I intended…**


	6. lucky number

**The December 6****th**** prompt, as assigned by Catherine Spark: **

**Holmes' lucky number**

* * *

"Holmes, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to decline. We've played twice already today."

"Nonsense, Watson. What harm is there in a bit of fun? We have nothing else what needs doing."

"I don't know what you would determine as "needs" to be doing, but I have plenty of my own work to consider. I haven't been the surgery what with the snow. I have work I can't put off."

"Just one more game. We could play a quick round of war."

"Holmes, just because you have nothing else with which to occupy yourself… besides, I've already won both times. Why play again?"

"Because three is my lucky number."

"Your what?"

"My lucky number."

"I wouldn't have thought you'd believe in such things as lucky numbers."

"But I've already lost so much on this, Watson. I can't bear to sit by myself waiting for you to come back. There's nothing else to do."

"Can't you take a case? There were people who visited yesterday and you refused them."

"I can't just take any case. You now that."

"All too well, Holmes. But there's not much else we can do."

"Just one more game of war. Just one."

"Holmes, I can't believe you. You're a grown man."

"Three is my lucky number, Watson. I'm feeling good about this."

"One more time."

* * *

**Felt like this turned out a bit confusing… eh. **


	7. Murray

**The December 7****th**** prompt, as assigned by silvermouse:**

**Murray and another soldier who are both old friends of Watson come over and visit.**

* * *

She poured the tea as they told their tales,

Stories of daring men gone to war

Of hours crouched in the muck

And nights spent caught in smoke and cards

Of battles with tokens of bullets exchanged

And nights spent in bloody, feverish disturb

Of comradery, bravery of friends

And nights with one more life saved

* * *

**Apologies for my unceremonious vanishing off the face of the earth. Currently drowning in an odd combination of Dickens and web design as the semester draws to a close. Hoping to catch up very soon. Oy.**


	8. Criminal

**The December 8****th**** prompt, as assigned by cjnwriter:**

**A cold blooded criminal kidnaps an Irregular.**

* * *

_Face taught, pale, speaking at unnatural speeds_

"Mr. Holmes, please, we need help,"

_Disheveled, clothing recently torn, fresh stains_

"It's Johnny,"

_Scenario: illness, no, wrong, face,_

"He's disappeared. There was a man…"

_Kidnapping, children defending, unsuccessful_

"He's gone, we tried to stop him but he got away."

"Where?"

~o~

_Signs of a scuffle, attempt to cover it up, accomplice_

_Confusion, droplets of red on the stones_

"They went off that way."

_Fits, trail leads down that street, dark alley, of course_

_Aren't nearby anymore, men in a hurry_

_Caught the scent_

~o~

_Sounds of crying from the house_

_Slap and a growl for silence_

_Alone in the street, waiting for the moment_

_Strike the bastard on the head_

~o~

_Crying, hands bound, unhurt_

_Taking back to Baker Street_

_Final kick to the man_

_Anger_

_Relief_


	9. Gaudete

**In a desperate bid to catch up, bit of a 221B that's actually a 221G…**

**The December 9 and 10 prompts, as assigned by silvermouse and Emma Lynch:**

**Gaudete/holding hands and loving it**

* * *

Christmas Eve. She sat curled in his lap, her hand clasped tightly in his, as the snow fell outside their window. The smell of wood smoke hung in the air, stinging the inside of their noses, fresh and dark, tinged with fruit tea that warmed by the stove. The coals, colored rich, glowed against the stone of the hearth. They warmed the room with a gentle heat as snow drifted outside the window.

Singing was heard outside the room, the voices of children harmonizing together in the light of street lamps only just lit. Their carol rose to mingle with soft breaths of husband and wife as they listened together.

_Gaudete, gaudete! Christus est natus_

_Ex Maria virgine, gaudete!_

His hand squeezed hers again and she leaned her head against his chest, inhaling, exhaling. A soft hum escaped his throat, contentedly holding her close.

_Tempus adest gratiæ_

_Hoc quod optabamus,_

_Carmina lætitiæer_

_Devote reddamus._

She lifted her head, looking at his eyes with a soft smile, bringing her lips to his and kissing them, so soft and gentle. Seeing him home, his strong arms around her, his eyes joyous and quiet.

Twas a night that came once a year, and one that they treasured so dearly.

"Merry Christmas, John."

"Merry Christmas, Mary."

_Gaudete, gaudete! Christus est natus_

_Ex Maria virgine, gaudete!_


End file.
